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CREP 092LP
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$25.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 7/15/2022
By now counting more than four decades of constant activity, Pierre Bastien erected such a towering and influential body of work that any blurb attempt regarding his music could easily fall into redundancy. Not that his revolving soundworld, deeply personal and unique, has ever stalled into gimmick or self-mimicry, being Bastien the tireless explorer whose vision can never be complete, only continuously redefined in a process of discovery equally playful and challenging. So, completely in touch with Discrepant's ethos. Returning to the label after 2017 The Mecanocentric Worlds of Pierre Bastien, the French musician, composer, and instrument builder, brings an array of instruments from different cartographies and legacies with the appropriately titled Sonic Folkways. Resorting to different types of horns, prepared trumpet, an army of percussion, from gongs and tambourine to castanets and maracas, violin and too many others to mention here, Bastien weaves together a highly textured and hypnotic mosaic that projects an exotica beamed from scraps of the future. "Aha!" in the same interstellar wavelength as Sun Ra's cosmic tones, "Moor's Room" almost orchestral tapestry of small percussion and insects or the non-western strings and tunings salvaged from ancient alien ceremonies on "Pan's Nap". In an era where so much ink has been shed about world building in experimental music, Bastien can actually claim that to himself. The otherworld is right here, indeed. Artwork collage by Evan Crankshaw. Mastered by Anne Taegert at Dubplates & Mastering.
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CREP 088LP
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Multi-groove single-sided LP. Parallel Traces Of The Jewel Voice by dj sniff is a project that takes inspiration from historical narratives and personal memories constructed around The Jewel Voice Broadcast (Gyokuon Hoso) that took place on August 15th, 1945. Contrary to common belief, Emperor Hirohito did not speak live on air to announce the surrender of Japan on this day. Instead, two lathe-cut discs with his recorded voice were skillfully mixed and played by NHK engineer Shizuto Haruna. Haruna's proto-DJ/turntablist performance was heard not only in Japan but also throughout the colonized territories in Asia, marking the end of World War II and Japanese rule. Interested in these aspects which often have been overlooked within the Japanese narratives of this historical event, dj sniff conducted research in both Taiwan and Japan. Over the course of three years, he collected various materials that include; interviews and field recordings, audio samples extracted from phonograph discs and recordings sessions with improvising musicians, and a re-reading of the Imperial Rescript on Surrender in Chinese. These were used to compose two compositions that are paired differently depending on their distribution format. The vinyl release is a multi-sided disc with two parallel grooves cut on one side, which in effect plays a different composition depending on where the stylus is cued. The other side has no audio but features two silkscreened lines that refer to how Haruna played the original lathe-cut discs. Additionally, an extensive text written by dj sniff accompanies this release. Sniff uncovers technical details of the recording and broadcasting of the emperor's voice that took place over 75 years ago. He also reflects on his encounters with the elderly community in Taiwan who spoke fluent Japanese and shared their personal stories after listening together to records from their childhood.
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CREP 089LP
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Third time's a charm. Or a chant in this case. Antologia De Música Atípica Portuguesa is back. Following two sold-out volumes, the unplanned trilogy comes to a close with chants and hymns whilst continuing to merge music genres and presenting them as a world building concept. If the first two volumes were dedicated to work (O Trabalho (CREP 035LP)) and regions (Regiões), it only made sense to close the trilogy with ceremonial music, connecting the real -- each musicians' creation -- with a fantasied celebration of Portuguese folk, traditions, and ghost methods within these unusual anthems. If you've listened to Niagara before, you probably felt this whole ceremonial thing going on. A perfect opener then, for this volume with Niagara's deep dive into proto religious-ambient music with "Paulo, Apolo e Pedro". It sets the tone for the next 35-minutes of ethereal like songs. Either you listen to musicians working within their natural habitat (João Pais Filipe or Filipe Felizardo) or feel them exploring new areas in their realm (Niagara, Joana Guerra or Serpente), this third volume manages to combine eight of the best underrated visionaries working in current day Portugal. In the past, Antologia da Música Atípica Portuguesa created an imaginary folktale where current day creations could live with the idea of archive or fake-folk. This volume forgets the world building and actually lives in it. Because this is the real Portugal. This is Portugal's folk. These are Portugal's chants. Embrace the otherworldly. Also features Jibóia, Folclore Impressionista, and Bruno Ardo.
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CREP 086LP
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In what seems like some sort of cosmic alignment bound to happen, the ever prolific and somewhat elusive Niagara make their way into the Discrepant catalog with 1807. Compiling tracks recorded between 2014 and 2018 that appeared scattered among very limited and long out-of-print self-released CDRs, the record feels as much out of time as deeply resonant with these times with no dancefloors. Stripping away most of the beat-based approach of early Príncipe releases and Ascender EPs, these 17 vignettes presented in the classic dance maxi 12" format dabble with escapism in a manner that projects them as potential DJ tools for lockdown. Deeply idiosyncratic, the trio from Loures shows an internal coherence that while not easy to grasp given their mutating creative impulses, weaves each different path into a sonic fiction all their own. Cobbled together from countless hours of jamming on warm spectral synths, field recordings, otherworldly textures or devious drum machines 1807 paints a vivid and dreamlike escape route that goes from the hypnotic arpeggios and rarefied synths of "Esc8" through the glowing tones and fragmented melodies of "Egyptiu" and into the malfunctioning swirl of the stark "Esc 10" or the polluted 4/4 thump and funky guitar line of "Mapas". Equally disruptive and inviting. All tracks composed by Niagara between 2014-2018.
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CREP 081LP
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Contemporary and historical Porest recordings channeled from behind the somnambulistic event horizon. The now sound... The bleak oblique. The minimal and the maximal. Filmic chamber drones, meditative radio massage and forged spiritual violence bury pop ephemera into the swirling murk of de facto instrumental nihilism and orchestral context-free drama. Side A: A harmful journey into sickness and despair. You get sick and die. Side B: You are healed. You stand erect and live forever. Layered field and radio recordings back electro-acoustic experiments via electric saz, strings, balypso, reeds, and synths. Big drones, small ensembles and mood-anthems recorded by Porest and friends between 1995 and 2020 in West Oakland, Germany, Sumatra, Syria, Hanoi and London.
Personnel: Mark Gergis - bağlama drama, balypso, bass, breath density, edits, electronics, gravel, horn, hot volume, foley, glass, Moroccan fiddle, site-recordings, organ, percussion, pulse wash, radios, recorder, reverb, synthesizers, tapes; Jerry Blue - electric guitar ("No Terracotta Relief"); Heco Davis - clarinet ("Liminal Treason"), saxophone ("One Million Dollars"); Erik Gergis - washtub bass & brushes ("One Million Dollars"), synth ("(Terlok)"), accordion ("Liminal Treason"); Peter Valsamis - co-arrangement/production & percussion ("(Terlok)"); Jeremy Wilson - marimba ("One Million Dollars").
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LP + CD + 7"
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CREP 083S-LP
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Kamana is a multiformat release inspired by and channeling the culture and traditions of the Aeta, an indigenous group from the Zambales region in the Philippines. One of the oldest inhabitants of the region the Aetas are also some of the most fascinating and ancient nomadic and hunter gathering cultures. The release goes from the realms of the real to the imaginary, from transcription to syncretism, from concrete to abstract. An (un)real sonic exorcism filled with ancestral frequencies, haunted ghosts and other animistic spirits roaming the Pinatubo forests. The release features a series of materials released in different formats from the field recording digital only release, an LP and CD release to a special 7" vinyl featuring an interview with a bat hunter. Also includes download with additional material.
"Kamana is a long due homage to the Aeta community that hosted me a few years back, fascinated by the endurance of these people and their connection to their land, devastated by the eruption of the Pinatubo volcano in 1991, they continued to go back to their ancestral lands surviving on basic agriculture and hunting bats and wild pigs. Living with them for weeks, I managed to capture some essential field recordings and sounds that form and compose the basis for this release, from the more reprocessed and interpreted LP release to the pure field recording documentation of the digital release. It is meant to be accessible to all and provide a window to the livelihoods of these unique communities. For this reason, this release serves as both an archival document and a syncretic one, trying to channel memories and feelings of living in these jungles whilst listening to their stories as well as witnessing their lifestyles." --Carlos Casas, 2021
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CREP 084LP
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Continuing Discrepant's ambitious People Like Us vinyl reissue program with Welcome Abroad -- a strangely relevant ten-year-old album (originally released in May 2011) when People Like Us aka Vicki Bennett became stranded in the US after the Icelandic Eyjafjallajökull volcano eruption closed much of northern Europe's airspace. Volcanically marooned in Baltimore and NYC, Bennett utilized some of her "free" time to work on the album and even gained audio contributions from fellow experimental musicians Jason Willett (of Half Japanese) and M.C. Schmidt (of Matmos) via her extended stay. Bennett derived thematic material of displacement, travel, and a longing for elsewhere from the natural disaster that caused her own predicament. Now strangely echoed by the Covid-19 outbreak and the various grounding of planes and stay at home policies worldwide. While the general mashup culture often centers on the instant gratification of seamlessly juxtaposing hooks, People Like Us tracks transform the source material into collages that are equal parts dissonance and pleasure, making artful commentaries on our culture and Bennett's own existential amusement within such a wondrous world. No one could have predicted how relevant this album would have been ten years later. Volcanoes or Viruses, Welcome Abroad is what happens when you're stranded due to a freak natural occurrence trapping people all over the world and causing mass plane cancellations.
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CREP 085LP
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Kink Gong is back with his unique take and re-interpretation of the music he's been recording and documenting for years in the South East Asian highlands. Zomia Vol. 1 takes the conceptual idea of Zomia, proposed by James C. Scott in The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland South East Asia (2009), to construct its very own mythological soundscape inspired by a semi-utopic region where state rules don't apply. Zomia might be (almost) gone but Kink Gong is keen keep its spirit alive by releasing a series of albums celebrating the region's quasi mythological features.
"Zomia is an idea, a concept that, not so long ago, there were two very distinct worlds in southeast Asia, the valley VS highland/hinterland, the civilization VS the primitive, paddy rice VS slash and burn agriculture, Buddhism VS Animism, fixed territory VS movement/migration, written system VS oral culture, the state VS anarchy, property VS squat, controlled population VS autonomy, bricks VS bamboo and wood and, at my level museumified traditional mainstream music VS real emotions/songs of devastated lives and/or gongs ceremonies with buffalo sacrifices, extreme heat in the valleys VS shade in the jungle. I could go on and on but let's not forget that Zomia is disappearing fast, if not altogether already. How many of the people I've recorded are still alive? As you might know, before composing new music from my own Zomian experience (from 2001 to 2014 in Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, and China) I had to find those musicians, be able to communicate with them, record them as good as I could with very limited finances and gradually release a collection of 160 CDrs. It is very important for me to make sure you to listen to the fantastic original recordings before or after you've listened to this experimental reconstruction I called Zomia. Expect more volumes to come, this is my biggest source of inspiration, and the reason why I've been involved for years in constructing a mythological experimental musical Zomian soundscape." --Laurent Jeanneau, Berlin 2020
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CREP 082CD
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Enter, Angst a series of musical "essays on the ephemeral being" by Portuguese pianist and composer Tiago Sousa. After 2015's Um Piano nas Barricadas (CREP 023LP, 2016) Sousa expands his compositional chops by writing and performing along with a trio made of clarinet, percussion and vibraphone adding a magical realism aura to the music. It was fate that the releasing of these compositions would arrive in one of the most troubled passages of recent memory, just as a new decade begins. If it was already established that anguish is one of the hallmarks haunting our modern era, these last few years expose this existential feeling with even greater urgency. The album that Tiago now presents, part angst part nostalgic escapism addresses this very modern concern as well as other themes dear to the so-called existentialist thinkers such as Heidegger, Camus or Kierkegaard, who among others, seek to directly challenge the Being with various concepts such as Repetition, Temporality, Interiority, Despair... Throughout the eight themes here presented, a delicate attempt is made to sketch a phenomenological cartography through its content and form, loosely describing the feeling of being launched into the wide world and the discovery of one self. In other words, the artist's aim here is to convey the growing pains that the whole question about the meaning of life throws at us. In an approach that is difficult to catalogue, the album tries to avoid genres and crystallizations in which music presents itself as a vehicle to express the ineffable and the incommunicable, expressing instead a magical world of wonder and enchantment.
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CREP 078LP
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Introducing a new project by Discrepant label boss Gonçalo F. Cardoso (Gonzo, Visions Congo, Papillon, Prophetas) and Tenerife electronic stalwarts Tupperwear (Mladen Kurajica and Dani Tupper). Diving deep into various phantom island mythologies (the elusive St. Brendan's island being a recurring motif) Lagoss borrow from the exotica playbook of ideas and twist it inside out into a bubbling melting pot of sounds, shapes, and patterns that eventually confuse, wonder, and (occasionally) scare the inattentive listener. Built like a schizophrenic booklet of moods, with 30+ vignettes describing the various habitats and moods of the local (imaginary) archipelago, Imaginary Island Music Vol. 1 offers grand visions of brave new old worlds, independent from the obvious, atypical lines of thought. There's no such thing as a break from mother nature here, fauna and flora take it all, a constant buzz of local predators, big and small, preying on everyone and anyone, constantly -- humans are just temporary guests here. A nautical almanac of remote notions from a forsaken land, built and rebuilt upon layer and layer of green and blue death -- forget Martin Denny, no armchair xylophone grooves here. All music by Lagoss. Artwork by Evan Crankshaw. Mastered by Rashad Becker. One-off vinyl edition of 500; printed inner sleeve.
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CREP 080LP
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Gritty, Odd & Good is a new weird, pseudo-music compilation curated by avant-garde experimental composer and audio artist Francisco López. As far as creation itself is concerned, big cities do not manifest anymore as the catalytic cultural centers they used to be. Their iconic status as hip locations seem more symbolic than real. The combined mighty forces of neocapitalist gentrification and telecommunication/information decentralization might have generated a substantially different landscape of geographical cultural distribution. And so unlikely places are also sources of physically-isolated, but culturally-interconnected, new creation. This is just but one more example of the larger phenomenon of techno-cultural atomization (not to be confused with the more restricted so-called "democratization") that allows millions of people to create and share, pre- and post-internet. The amateur is the new potential master; and that is decided by the crowd in the circus and the stadium, not at the academy. With all of this comes the potential for new aesthetics, or at least the open-ended evolution of the previous ones -- far better than the current confusion between ethics and aesthetics -- from the uninformed and the unknown. Atomization of this kind also brings for some the desire and the right to anonymity. And so it is for the unknown obscure artists of this compilation of weird experimental music -- "gritty, odd & good", with drones, glitches, cut-ups and more -- who won't reveal anything beyond their unlikely locations: San Marino, French Guiana, Philippines, Lesotho, Oman, Faroe Islands, Tuvalu, Liechtenstein, Kyrgyzstan. An innovative compilation presenting a world of unusual experimental de-constructed and recombined music casting a strong and exciting light into the unusual corners of our world. Dive in. Compiled and mastered by Francisco López. Vinyl mastered by Rashad Becker. Features Giuseppe Moretti, Daryana Jean, James Ocampo, Thabiso Makhetha, Rashid Al Balushi, Lív Jacobsen, Eteroa Apinelu, Zzodiakk, and Alima Akmatova.
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CREP 077LP
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After his debut album for Discrepant, Papillon (CREP 009LP, 2013), and a couple of tapes for Dinzu Artefacts (Aqueducts, 2017) and Sucata Tapes (Cercueill Flottant, 2019 (SUC 022CS)), Papillon aka Gonçalo F. Cardoso returns to the wax treatment for one last hurrah into the depths of tropical disquiet. Taking liberties from Henri Charriere's book sequel of the same name, Banco (1972), the audio reader here dives straight up/down into a world of random dream logic. The same themes of nightmare vs. paradisiac dreams are present here yet with more nuance than the first volume. The adventure here is more subdued, less spiritual as most of it is lived outdoors, free from the state's shackles of abuse. A lighter tone then, for what will probably be the last Papillon adventure. As with the first volume the album counts with contributions from fellow label artists, Mike Cooper, Cédric Stevens, David Daan, and Yannick Dauby all feature in a way or another, raw or cooked into a boiling pot of irreverence. All tracks were composed and edited by Gonçalo F Cardoso in the island of La Gomera, Lisbon and London between 2017-2019. Mastered by Rashad Becker. Edition of 300.
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CREP 058CD
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Double-CD version of Mike Cooper's now classic 2018 release Tropical Gothic -- now released with a bonus live performance recorded at London's Café Oto. On Tropical Gothic, Mike Cooper studies different approaches to his method of uniting guitar and field recordings into a constant stream of sound, where he delivers chaos and melody -- not necessarily in that order. A series of shorter pieces open the album. Each of them offering a myriad of images and sensations, between the enigmatic and terror ("The Pit"), joy, happiness, and freedom ("Running Naked"), or pure contemplation ("Onibaba"). The album closes with its 18th minute magical piece "Lelong & Gods Of Bali". A mix of ambient exotica music, silent film soundtrack, and distorted rhythms that dance around Mike's guitar. It keeps reinventing and transforming itself throughout those eighteen minutes, summing up the dexterity and muscle of Mike Cooper's music of the last two decades. Tropical Gothic - Live At Cafe Oto was performed as a live improvised version of Mike's release of the same name. Joined on stage by Clive Bell and Sylvia Hallet and performed alongside three of Mike's videos -- "Ko Lanta", "Walking In Ubin", and a mash up containing excerpts from some of Mike's favorite "tropical gothic" films -- Onibaba (1964), Opera Jawa (2006), Kwaidan (1964), Tabu (2012), and White Shadows In The South Seas (1928). Both Clive and Sylvia play an array of Asian and "exotic" instruments; both are improvisers and have been playing together on and off over many years. Sylvia had collaborated with David Toop on his opera Star Shaped Biscuit, a work that might also be considered tropical gothic and Clive Bell, an international traveler, writer, and expert player of the Japanese shakuhachi flute, as well as other Asian blown instruments, is very familiar with Mike Cooper's musical excursions into ambient/electronic/exotica. Personnel: Mike Cooper - lap steel guitar, iPhone, Zoom sampletrack, Kaos Pad, Mini Kaos Pad, Mini Disc, Pitch Shifter Delay, Video; Sylvia Hallett - violin, bowed bicycle wheel, saw, sawn-off lampshade, jaws harp, mbira, delay pedal, pitch shift pedal, looper pedal; Clive Bell - shinobue, shakuhachi, khene, pi saw flute, Cretan pipes. Recorded Live by James Dunn at Cafe Oto on September 28th, 2018. Disc 1 mastered by Rashad Becker. Disc 2 mastered by Emmet O'Donnel.
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CREP 072LP
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Over the last decade, multi-instrumentalist Tomás Tello has been developing his own personal music style based around an exploration of the guitar and his intense personal investigation of traditional Peruvian music -- in particular Andean culture which he grew up with. Now operating out of Tavira, Tomás has been functioning like a psychic musician, a well-tuned antenna picking a unique sound universe where, among others, sounds of native instruments (quenas, drums, charangos) and experimental electronics (field recordings, loops, circuit bending, small synths, and effects pedals) merge in mystic harmony. Tomás delivers meditative compositions, sonic illuminations which seem to be the result of a direct act of contemplation, of glaring at the immensity of a landscape, a river or the proximity of strange wild animals, a vision calling that, with the aid of medicinal plants, offers a state of consciousness in tune with the early works of envisioned artists such as Arturo Ruiz del Pozo, Jorge Reyes, or Walter Maioli. Tomás Tello's music is an invitation to listen to nature from a new place. It's timeless music, which enraptures those who have the joy of entering it. Artwork by Evan Crankshaw and Raleigh Gardiner. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker.
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CREP 071LP
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"In this 24-minute composition, released here in its original name for the first time, Raed Yassin encapsulates and condenses the aural and sonic landscapes experienced by those who bore witness to the war. In the 1980s, while the Lebanese Civil War, which ravaged the country between 1975 and 1990, was raging, television but particularly transistor radios were the only means through which people heard the news during interminable periods of power cuts or waiting in basement shelters. The audio material was collected by Yassin on his regular trips to the dispersed and neglected archives of militias and political parties, radio, and TV stations, and record shops across Lebanon. Built from over 300 hours of material, Yassin has woven together a composition using political speeches; radio and television commercials; news flashes and jingles; local '80s pop music; dubbed Japanese anime songs; propaganda, resistance, and revolutionary party songs; snippets from Ziad Rahbani plays, and many more. The recordings in CW Tapes are the sonic equivalents of Proust's madeleines to any individual who was old enough to remember the war and its immediate aftermath. Commercials, songs, and speeches collide and intertwine as if Yassin had plugged a radio tuner into his mind, sounding out a deeply personal sonic terrain that echoes the hidden sonic memories of his contemporaries. Beside the diversity of its sounds, what is most striking in this record is the minute attention to the musicality of the different recordings Yassin uses, whether they are propaganda pieces, vocal patterns or news jingles. What you hear in the beginning of the CW Tapes, for example, is Raed Yassin's fascination for the different political and musical figures that populated the Lebanese media landscape across the 1980s. In this bewildering introduction, he highlights the absurdity of the war by lacing together a political speech given by Bachir Gemayel with a frivolous and upbeat pop song by Lebanese pop singer Sammy Clark whose tunes are heard at different moments in the piece. The composition unfurls an array of overlapping tonalities and textures as well as a glossolalia made of processed voices that inhabited the archaic technologies of the time . . . In his continuous efforts to mine and work through the sonic archives of Lebanon's recent past, the CW Tapes is possibly Yassin's most personal output to date." --Rayya Badran, Beirut, January 2019 Mastered and Cut by Rashad Becker
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CREP 069LP
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Previously released on CD accompanied by Gone, Gone Beyond, The Mirror is the dreamy soundtrack of an A/V project from collage artist extraordinaire Vicki Bennett aka People Like Us. With The Mirror Bennett continues her eternal disassembling of popular music by exploring how the narrative of familiar sounds/songs can change dramatically under a new context, with that context always changing, in a never-ending flow. Each song is singular. And each song is a collage of an undefined number of other songs from other artists. It sounds familiar because that has been the modus operandi of People Like Us since the early 1990s. But The Mirror plays with the notion of the familiar, driving around a collection of famous pop songs/artists, messing around with the memory of the listener and, of course, one's unique comprehension of those specific songs applied in a new context. Because of the use of familiar pop sounds, The Mirror is often grandiose, like an epic film with only highs, never letting the listener down or letting them doubt the power of pop. Even, of course, when the coordinates are twisted, mixed, over or underrepresented. Each moment feels like something that could only happen in a parallel universe. Although that may sound naïve, it's just a lost thought of reaction to the beautiful collages of People Like Us in The Mirror. This mirror doesn't reflect an image of ourselves or an image of pop. But an image on the way memories drift and are being constant rebuilt. An unfinished collage. Mastered by Mark Gergis; vinyl cut by Rashad Becker.
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CREP 070LP
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Maybe it's too much to ask for a moment of your attention. As you grow older and keep diving into this era of information, disinformation, fake news, and all that, you might also tend to take a step back and listen to the intents of those social media adverts that tell us to slow down, breathe in, breathe out, enjoy everything around you a little bit. So, if it's not too much to ask, you can press play and start enjoying D-A-D. If you're doing that, you can even stop reading this, because you don't need further instructions. It's the second time in less than two years that Discrepant has released music from London based Greek musician Tasos Stamou (Athens, 1978). The wordplay of Musique Con Crète (CREP 054LP, 2018) was a backdoor to an adventurous and "concrete" experience with sound. D-A-D follows up on that. Recorded between 2015-2018 as an homage to both his Dad and the more commonly used tuning on the Greek Bouzouki, D-A-D, Stamou delivers 40 minutes of music that explores ancient and modern languages, while crossing his unique instrumentation with celebrations of new/old folk, field recordings, and electronics. In his music, there's a constant flow of ideas that defy standard tonalities and the conception of "traditional". Improvisation was the starting point for the creation of some of the nine pieces Tasos Stamou wrote for D-A-D. The electronics often serve to interact with field recordings that are wisely manipulated, while acoustic instruments, like a Bouzouki, build up the connection with the tradition and the necessity to slow down. With his unique atmospheres, Tasos is whispering some life hacks to build a better life. Nowadays, it's quite rare for a record to organize the way the listener wants to listen to music, to sounds. D-A-D creates a beautiful systematization between old and new, folk/traditional music and the technology in sound. All songs by Tasos Stamou. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker.
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CREP 063LP
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Comic book artist, graphic designer, and free jazz improviser are only some of the many talents from Beirut born Mazen Kerbaj. After appearing as part of various ensembles on the label, Ariha Brass Quartet and Johnny Kafta Anti-Vegetarian Orchestra, Kerbaj finally lands a solo outfit of his own onto the Discrepant dancefloor of misdemeanor. 14 years after his first (and only) solo album Brt Vrt Zrt Krt (Al Maslakh, 2005), Mazen returns with a series of loud oozes (entirely) of his own with not one but two(!) solo albums of prepared trumpet that further cement his international position as a serial trumpet botherer. Showcasing his very own and singular arsenal of squawks, cackles, howls and squeals the notion of being transported to a luring mutant underwater alien community is only occasionally dispelled with the sporadic passages of fluctuating tones and pulsations, like a restful humpback whale puffing on a hookah pipe at the ocean's deep end. Mazen pulls out all the proverbial stops here, displaying a unique mastering of the instrument and its improbable add-ons creating various vignette like episodes rich in texture and variations -- unlike anything else out there -- not that you'd knew anyway. Where Vol. 2.1 shows an astounding use of the instrument without recurring to cuts, overdubs, or electronics, Vol. 2.2 raises (or shatters) the bar with its intentional use of everything Vol. 2.1 was denied. And Mazen is right about advising his listeners, the sounds emitted on each record are beyond the limits of believable. Either he is using tricks or just prepared techniques the results go far beyond the reach of a normal or casual listener. Listen to the albums back-to-back and you'll understand.
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CREP 064LP
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Comic book artist, graphic designer and free jazz improviser are only some of the many talents from Beirut born Mazen Kerbaj. After appearing as part of various ensembles on the label, Ariha Brass Quartet and Johnny Kafta Anti-Vegetarian Orchestra, Kerbaj finally lands a solo outfit of his own onto the Discrepant dancefloor of insubordination. 14 years after his first (and only) solo album Brt Vrt Zrt Krt (Al Maslakh, 2005) Mazen returns with a series of subtle compositions of his own with not one but two(!) solo albums of prepared trumpet that further cement his international position as a serial trumpet botherer. Whilst Vol. 2.1 showcases his (almost) (un)familiar arsenal of squawks, cackles, howls and squeals, Vol. 2.2 goes deep into the nether regions of waltzing drones and bell tweaks so deep that would make most cetaceans lose their concentration. The notion of being transported to a luring mutant underwater alien community is still present on these long(er) trips with the added meditative pieces being occasionally pierced by noise creepers, nothing is what you want or expect and that's the way it should be. If Vol. 2.1 is the classic follow up LP, this one is the beast from the deep, it comes surging and screeching from a deep oceanic sink hole, only to hypnotize you with perverted dance moves before diving back into the sinking, wettest and darkest cave in the world. Vol. 2.2 is a summons album; it shatters any bar there was with its intentional use of everything Vol. 2.1 was denied. It grabs you by wherever available way and it only releases you when you're ready to listen to it again. Listen to both albums back-to-back, in no particular order and you'll know that there's nothing you can do but come back to it like a doped-up seal stranded in a phantom island -- appearing and disappearing as the music dictates it to.
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CREP 068LP
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Ross Alexander first came to our attention with Memorias Vol. 1 - Bugandan Sacred Places (SUC 007CS), released back in 2017 on Sucata Tapes. The release featured a mind-altering mix of recorded sounds from a series of visited sites considered sacred within the Bugandan Kingdom and session recordings with Ugandan musicians Albert Sempeke and the Nilotika Collective layered with his own original composition using the Yamaha DX7 and programmed FM synthesis. The result was a unique reconfiguration of new age vocabulary with East African traditional sensibilities. The tape quickly sold out and the new Volume Of Memorias presented here arrives now on the mother label Discrepant, comes on vinyl with an expanded sound palette appropriate to the format. Memorias Vol. 2 - High Atlas To The Sahara Desert is the logical progression of Volume 1; based on a series of field recordings Alexander made during a trip through the High Atlas Mountains and into the Sahara Desert in 2018. The aim of the trip was to visit a gathering of nomadic musicians at an oasis close to the Algerian border. Like Memorias Vol. 1, the recordings made on the trip were then later processed, layered, and arranged with original compositions. Where Vol. 1 had clear nods to new age music, this volume explores the more ambient side of '80s industrial sound. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker.
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CREP 067LP
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Sometimes one knows it's coming, sometimes it's unexpected, but the time to hang up one's boots will always come. It's better when one has total control over the moment, even better if things end on a high (or on a low). After seven years of sonic interferences, calibrating the soundscape of field recordings and helping to recreate the old sounds of today, Gonzo is retiring from music. It's a goodbye, and a well-crafted one at that. But Ruído(s) doesn't sound like an intentional farewell. It won't be heard on any of the thirteen tracks that scavenge for a solution in the space between ambient music and field recordings. It won't be felt in the intense connection between human and natural sounds; how sometimes everything oscillates in opposite states of mind. One won't even read it in the intense-yet-subtle humor present in some of the pieces. This is all because it's not an intentional goodbye. What is it then? It's a celebration of random sound. How can one experience something scholastic and simultaneously deeply hilarious? Just think about the amazing triad formed by "A Fuga Dos Grilos." "Degredado(s)," and "Cantiga Parva". First, one is blessed with six minutes that build up on the idea that sound can be an intense religious experience, echoes going back and forth to create a fantastic Boiler Room feeling (one populated with raving Gonzos doing dabs in front of the camera) that eventually ends with a cinematic touch -- someone saying the title of the song out loud. One second after we are into the Flying Lizards world, with two songs that shake any pretentious seriousness of the previous track. Is it serious or not? It is. But it doesn't have to be. On Ruído(s) Gonzo recounts pop/electronic history through field recordings and weird-soft beats. More than compiling his seven-year history, Gonzo is more worried about understanding where he's leaving his ideas, Caretaker-style. As the album progresses and the need to revisit it grows, it becomes clearer that Ruído(s) is more than an artist self-indulging in his work -- in a very good manner. It's also a condensed catalog of Portuguese music and its sounds, a circular trip down the memory lane of a forgotten country and its landscape. Ruído(s) is a goodbye to a country and its traditions. It does it without sulking but with the most respectful loud laugh -- the Gonzo way.
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CREP 066LP
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La Danza del Agua (The Dance of Water) is an eclectic musical journey through Latin American experimentalism -- a sort of unofficial companion to the Antologia De Musica Atipica Portuguesa (Anthologies of Atypical Portuguese Music) volumes, but focusing on South American music themes instead. Originally released as two volumes (digital and cassette versions) on Papaki Records (2017, Argentina), this new concise edition presents 12 of the original 38 artists. Not to be seen as exhaustive document representing the wide styles of the even wider continent, it hopes to showcase some of its more marginal music with artists from a variety of countries such as Argentina, Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, and Venezuela. As such, this compilation shines a wider light on new and exciting sounds from the vast continent with a wide range of styles such as digital cumbias, sound experimentation, freak folk, noise, exotica, danceable beats, and much more, mixed together to give life to the continuing strange world of contemporary South American experimental music. A logical continuation of our new weird South American explorations after releasing works from Meridian Brothers, Romperayo, Chupame El Dedo, and a tape batch on Sucata sister label featuring Panchasila, Los Siquicos Litoraleños, Bardo Todol, Tomás Tello, and more. Features Tomás Tello, Wellman, Joa Joys, Horacio, Simón vs Saimon, M3Y, Manrico Montero, Gil Sanson, Pandelindio, Gustavo Obligado, Ciudad Satélite, and José Soberanes.
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CREP 065LP
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Kasenian Réak is a genre of performative art from the Priangan area of west Java, organized during hajatans (life-cycle celebrations) and nowadays primarily held during weddings and circumcisions. The style, known as a seni lungsuran, is part of the greater family of Javanese horse dances, originally known in their most famous forms of jathilan and kuda lumping. Javanese horse dances, which could be as old as animistic Java, may already have been practiced before the eighth-century, traveling through the island and reaching Priangan in the thirties, when Réak is believed to have been originated and popularized by musical groups Juarta Putra and Maska Putra. While bearing more than some resemblances with its family, Kasenian Réak benefits of structures and aesthetic tracts of its own, being not only one of the newest developments of horse dance if not the newest, but also its rawest and most extreme outcome. The shows usually last up to nine hours, starting at nine o'clock in the morning and finishing between five or six o'clock in the afternoon. The morning part is dedicated to the pembukaan (ouverture), lasting up to one hour and dogcing or dogdog cicing (playing the dogdog on spot), while the afternoon is the time during which the arak-arakan (parade) takes place. After the arak-arakan goes around the village gathering people and announcing the celebration, it returns to the lot where it had begun and the show ends with a shorter dogcing. During the first dogcing it is possible to witness the dance of Bangbarongan: an animal-like creature costume representing a spirit and an ancestor, worn by a dancer who brings it alive for some hours. This is among the most exciting parts of the show. Sometimes it is also possible to witness a symbolic fight between the pimpinan and the Barong. Trance and possession obviously represent two of the main attractions of the style. The music as a sonic signal given by the speeded tempo, along with an Adorcistic practice conducted by the ma'alim are capable of inviting spirits to enter bodies and take control of them. When possessed, the individuals can, according to the entity they host, exhibit superhuman capacities. This release aims to provide a spectrum of Kasenian Réak and its music. The first side is a classic réak ouverture, played by one of the two founding groups, Juarta Putra. On the other side is Putra Jaya Melati: one of the groups that most attempts to push towards a contemporary, aggressive, and experimental version of Réak music.
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CREP 062LP
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French sound artist Félix Blume keeps pushing the boundaries of field recordings for everyone's enjoyment. Fog Horns captures the sounds of boat horns in Piraeus, Athens, Greece, the port city that serves some of the most important ferry routes in Greece nowadays. Yes, boat horns are annoying, sometimes disturbing and even absurdly disrupting if you live in a port city or one that is blessed with the arrival of cruises -- everyone knows that. But recordings of funerals could be tricky, and Félix Blume pulled a gem out of 2018's Death In Haiti: Funeral Brass Bands & Sounds from Port Au Prince (CREP 051LP). And he has done it again. The A side reveals a long track recorded during a fog horn concert whilst side B features three "remixes" of the same recordings, paying respect to what Ingram Marshall did in Fog Tropes in three different "movements". In a way, B side sounds like the perfect soundtrack for the recent remake of Suspiria (2018). But Thom Yorke got in the way. Jokes aside, there's something magical about these horns. In the eighteen minutes of the first side, Félix Blume explores the concept of a concert played by those horns. The horns dominate but sounds of the surroundings create a perfect balance to the drone hysteria. The surrounding sounds are the heartbeat of this track. The horns are the metal section of an orchestra, while the rest works like the strings. Hidden melodies are revealed when you listen to this with your full attention, and the more you do it, the horns become less present, vivid. It's one of the many crafts of Félix Blume, the more you live with his music, the more you focus outside the plot. If those eighteen minutes sound tremendously real, the three tracks on the other side feel like a horror film. The warmth disappears to become cold ambiance, beautifully textured and enigmatic sounds take over. Horns are still heard, but they're a different kind of horns. It seems that Félix Blume is playing with our perception, from bliss to horror. A honk will never be the same again.
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CREP 060LP
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Earlier this decade, when Óscar Silva chose his alias Jibóia, he was already thinking of the variations his music would take on in each record. Jibóia is Portuguese for boa constrictor and by his fourth record his instincts and ability to change over his sound and search for different collaborators to reach his intentions was manifest. After collaborating with the likes of Makoto Yagyu, Sequin, Xinobi, Ricardo Martins, and Jonathan Saldanha on his previous records, in OOOO he goes deep into interconnecting his music with other musicians/past collaborators. Joined by Martins and André Pinto, Óscar created a record that sounded like Jibóia with the direct collaboration of the musicians that accepted the invitation. And what does it means to sound like Jibóia? A fluent and rich dialogue between outer-world sounds mixed with a free jazz approach to rock. It's music that's doing soul-searching without any space or time barriers. It flows as it should; OOOO is no different. Inspired by the philosophy of Pythagoras and his concept Musica Universalis, it speaks about an interspatial harmony created by the movement of the planets and the sound frequency it creates. It's a poetic theory that imagines the sound produced by the movement of the planets and what we can listen to when we listen to the universe. The first three tracks are a reference to those frequencies and the last one, "Topos", references an idea of accomplishment, of arrival and the sum of the experience. OOOO is a bit of a trip, a voyage of imagined sounds produced by three musicians in a constant dialogue, and with a different focus in each track. Each of the first three tracks are developed with a focus on the instruments of each musician, while the other two expand and enrich the range of the initial movement. On the final one, they explore the flux of ideas each brings to OOOO. However, it's not intended to be a conclusion or an end to OOOO; it's an open circuit of ideas that reinforces the free-minded rock that the three musicians explore, creating a new place where their music finds new routines. It just makes one want to go back to the beginning, again and again, reinforcing the feeling that Jibóia belongs to this world without sounding like anything from this world. RIYL: Sun Ra, Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, Ohm.
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